look of the white house. congress was not going to fund it. truman said he would find the money to do it anyway. >> white house historical association president stuart mclaurin sunday night on c-span's "q&a." you can listen to "q&a" and all of your podcasts wherever you get your podcasts or on our free c-span now app. >> c-span, democracy unfiltered. we are funded by these television companies and more, including comcast. ♪ >> the flag replacement program got started by a friend of mine, a navy vet that saw a flag in the office that needed to be replaced and said wouldn't it be great if this was something we did for everyone? comcast has always been a community-driven company. this is one of those examples of the way we are getting out

there. >> comcast supports c-span as a public service, along with these other television providers, giving you a row seat democracy. >> u.s. attorney general pam bondi testified on oversight in the justice department as part of it for a half-hour hearing before the justice committee. she talked about the trump administration's handling of the epstein files, including wife no one had been prosecuted east on the information revealed in the redacted documents. >> we welcome everyone to

today's hearing on oversight of the department of justice. >> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> we will begin with opening statements. the chair has recognized 18 cities, 11 states, three counties, and the district of columbia are sanctuary jurisdictions. accounting for 31% of the population in this country. 31% of the american people. almost one third of the american people live in a city, county, or state with a left leadership tells local law enforcement not to work with federal law enforcement. what does that mean in practice? let's look at abraham gonzalez who on september 20, 20 20 three

was arrested by border patrol for illegally entering the united states. of course, the biden administration released him into the country. five months later, february 26, 2024 mr. gonzales is charged with assault. two weeks later on march 11, 2024 he is charged with felony motor vehicle theft, stole a car . march 20, 2020 for nine days later he is arrested by the denver police and placed in the denver justice center. six days later march 22, 2024, i.c.e. sends a detainer notice saying if you are going to release mr. gonzales, can you give us a heads up? can you let us know 48 hours before you are going to release this guy so we can come apprehend him at the jail? remember, a detainer is a final order of removal from a court. for this individual or this individual has committed some removable offense.

on february 28, 2025 abraham gonzales is released to the streets. we can put that up. we have the form from the denver justice center. what kind of inmate was mr. gonzales for those 345 days he was in the denver justice center? we have that too. violent to the staff, keeps separate -- this guy was so bad you had to keep him away from other inmates. he had already assaulted some staff member. denver released this guy to the streets instead of turning them over to i.c.e. agents who would have come to the jail interested him there. we know what happens. when the officers did apprehend mr. gonzales out on the street, he assaulted one of the officers. this is what happens when you have the sanctuary jurisdiction. in minnesota there are 1003 hundreds 60 detainer notices for violent offenders. governor walz and others have

released 400 70 criminal illegal aliens back to the streets. new york state it is 7000. nationwide it is over 17,000 that we know of. where a detainer was filed, since president trump has been in office, over 17,000 times a detainer was filed in those individuals were released to the streets instead of turned over to federal law enforcement. 17,864 times, illegals who have been charged with a crime have been released into the streets and thereby jeopardizing the safety of the public, the safety of law enforcement, and the migrant themselves. frankly, helping create the environment that results in the tragic deaths like we saw with ms. good and mr. pretti. a few years ago sarah huckabee sanders said this in the state of the union address, the divide in america today is normal versus crazy, and it's true.

it's crazy not to have a border, which is what we had under the previous administration, crazy to abolish i.c.e., and crazy to abolish bad guys who are here illegally to the streets when with one phone call federal law enforcement will come to the jail and pick them up. the mindset that says it is ok to release these guys is the same left-wing mindset that thinks it's ok'd to weaponize government against your political opponents. that's exactly what we had in the previous justice department. the biden-harris department of justice called parents domestic terrorists. the justice department used fbi swat teams to arrest pro-mike advocates. the biden-harris doj targeted traditional catholics, pressured social media companies to censor americans and launched not one but two investigations into president trump, spending over $35 million to try to bring down their political opponent. to further this effort they

sought the phone records of over a dozen republican members of congress. even the democrats said this was wrong. they even paid to release 120,000 dollars for information on president trump. while doing all this they couldn't tell us who planted the pipe bombs, who leaked the dobbs opinion, and who put cocaine in the white house. thank goodness the american people saw through it all. americans were tired of being targeted for their beliefs, the law fair come of the crime through the country and that is why they overwhelmingly elected president trump. what a difference a year makes. under attorney general bondi the doj has returned to its core mission of upholding the full of law, going after that guys come keeping americans safe. the term justice department restore the rule of law, d.c. violent crime is down by 28%. the federal surge in d.c. resulted in a thousand arrests, the seizure of 800 illegal guns,

and the recovery of 16 missing kids. the two term justice department apprehended a suspect in the pipe bomb investigation and they have arrested six of the fbi's 10 -- top 10 most wanted fugitives. in just one year. of course, they arrested narco terrorist nicolas maduro and seized a record number of drugs flowing into this country. the term justice department put an end to targeting americans for their beliefs. attorney general bondi rescinded attorney general garland's anti-parent memorandum. the department of justice and the practice of using the face act to target pro-life americans, refused to tolerate attacks on places of worship, investigations of traditional catholics that we saw in the previous administration on her first day attorney general bondi disbanded the foreign influence task force that was pressuring social media companies to censor americans. the term justice department has ended lawfare. they worked to expose the

political nature of arctic frost in the jack smith investigations. turned over hundreds of pages of documents to congress and that is why we know mr. smith paid at least $20,000 to some confidential human source. that's why we know jack smith knew it was unconstitutional to seek the toll records from numbers, but since the litigation risk was low and because members would never find out about the subpoena until years later, they charge ahead and violated the constitution. the term justice department has changed doj policy to require prosecutors to tell judges if indio's relate to members of the separate but equal branch of government and congress. to top it off the term justice department opened investigations into conspiracy behind the russia collusion hoax. the justice department has put common sense ahead of politics, to keep boys out of girls sports they secured deals with universities to stop race-based and anti-semitic practices, and

after discovering rampant fraud in minnesota, the justice department and leadership of attorney general bondi has established a new national fraud division. i met with collin mcdonald who will head that division last week. i think he will do a great job. there is a lot of work to be done in that area. i want to thank the attorney general for her great work in the first year on the job, and i want to thank you for being here. with that i would yield to the ranking number for an opening statement. >> thank you kindly, mr. chairman. welcome attorney general bondi. you have the best lawyers job in america because your mission is justice and your clients are the american people. to promote justice for the people, you have to listen to the victims. like the women seated behind you today. those are just some of the hundreds of survivors of jeffrey epstein's global sex trafficking ring who are demanding that the truth be told and are demanding accountability for the abusers who trafficked and raped them.

you still haven't met with these survivors. with their permission, let me introduce to you the survivors and late survivors' family members present today. teresa helm, jess michaels, laura bloom mcgee, liz stein, skye and amanda roberts, the family of the late virginia giuffre, lisa phillips. you're not showing a lot of interest in the victims, madame attorney general, whether it is epstein's human trafficking ring or the homicidal governmenta l violence in minnesota. you siding with the perpetrators and ignoring the victims. that will be your legacy unless you act quickly to change course. you are running a massive epstein cover-up right out of the department of justice. you have been ordered by subpoena and congress to turn

over 6 million documents, photographs, videos in the epstein files, but you have turned over only 3 million. you say you are not turning over the other 3 million because they are somehow duplicative, but we know that there are actual memos of victim's statements in there, and you also took down the department of justice's prosecution memo from 2019, so it is clearly not all duplicative. even if it were, why not release it? just release all of the duplicate of stuff. the half that you did produce, you redacted the names of the abusers come enablers, accomplices, and co-conspirators, apparently to spare them the embarrassment and disgrace, which is the exact opposite of what the law ordered you to do. even worse, you have shockingly failed to redact many of the victims' names, which is what you were ordered to do by congress. some of the victims had come forward publicly, but many had not. many had kept their torment

private. even from family. and friends. but you published their names, their identities, their images on thousands of pages for the world to see. so, you ignored the law, and even with over 100,000 employees at your disposal, you acted with some mixture of staggering incompetence, cold indifference, and jaded cruelty towards more than 1000 victims, raped, abused, and trafficked. this performance screams cover-up. convicted sex trafficker and groomer ghislaine maxwell opened the gates of hell to virginia giuffre and hundreds of other victims as virginia recorded in "nobody's girl, but when maxwell was subpoenaed you and todd blanche quickly moved her from a higher security prison to a minimum security camp in texas

where she has enjoyed five star treatment, including catered meals, private gym time, and access to a therapy puppy, all because todd blanche, who has utterly failed to investigate the monstrous crimes of epstein and maxwell's co-conspirators, spent nine hours with maxwell and satisfied himself that she would have nothing untoward to say about donald trump, which is your only real interest in the matter based on institutional performance. but abandoning victims and coddling perpetrators is what you do best. when the fbi opened a criminal investigation into the brutal killing in minneapolis of renee good, a poet, and 37-year-old mother of three, by trump's masked paramilitary i.c.e. agents come you shut it down. you claim you're investigating the cold-blooded murder of alex pretti, an icu nurse at the v.a., but how can we trust the administration when the

president kristi noem called him a domestic terrorist and stephen miller called him a would-be assassin? not only do you refuse to share evidence with state and local investigators and prosecutors in minnesota, you have blocked their access to the crime scene and the evidence. how are you seeking justice for martinez, the montessori school teacher in chicago shot five times by a border patrol agent who bragged about it on text? or the family of keith porter, the family of two shot and killed by an off-duty i.c.e. agent in l.a.? or the family of gonzalez shot and killed in illinois minutes after he dropped his kids off at school? there is no sign of any movement at the department of justice. you even launched a criminal investigation into renee good's grieving widow. how sick is that? it's even worse. you have turned to the people's department of justice into trump's instrument of revenge. trump orders prosecutions like pizza and you deliver every

time. he tells you to go after james comey, letitia james, lisa cook, jerome powell the head of the federal reserve board, and members of congress like adam schiff, mark kelly, elissa slotkin, chrissy houlahan, chris deluzio, maggie goodlander, and you snapped to it. you replace real prosecutors with counterfeit stooges who robotically do the president's bidding. nothing in american history comes close to this complete corruption of the justice function and contamination of federal law enforcement. the good news is many serious lawyers at doj, including some of your own original appointees, have refused your lawless orders. daniel sassoon, your original pick for acting u.s. attorney in manhattan, resigned rather than follow your corrupt order to quash an indictment against mayor eric adams as a political favor from donald trump. the federalist society member

who clerked for justice scalia, u.s. attorney daniel sassoon refused to participate in this corrupt scheme. her top assistant, an iraqi war vet and two time bronze star recipient who clerked for chief justice roberts and judge kavanaugh, promptly resigned, too. writing, "i expect he will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool or enough of a coward to file your motion, but it was never going to be me." you and the president nominated eric siebert, a 15 year prosecutor, to be your u.s. attorney for the eastern district of virginia. but after five months of investigating letitia james and james comey, he found no evidence to justify criminal charges. so, you forced him out. he replaced him with lindsey halligan, trump's personal lawyer from the mar-a-lago documents case, who had zero prosecutorial experience and no qualifications. and then you were humiliated when a federal judge found that

this corrupt appointment was blatantly unlawful and throughout halligan's indictments entirely. grand jury juries of american citizens have repeatedly rejected your vendettas, and baseless indictments brought by that hacks left at doj now with two different grand jury's in virginia voting down indictments against letitia james in a single week. yesterday, another grand jury shut down your vendetta factory by rejecting indictments against the six members of congress who had spoken out to remind all service members that they have a duty to refuse illegal orders. you tried to get a grand jury to indict six members of congress who are veterans of our armed forces on charges of seditious conspiracy simply for exercising their first amendment rights. i hope you will heed the wisdom, the constitutional patriotism of those grand jurors and not try it again by doubling down on the humiliation. as were best lawyers are sacked for having participated in the january 6 case or flee for the

exits now, your new borders keep lying in court in dozens of cases. they have been excoriated for lying to federal judges. chief judge bowes berg suggested were department of justice perpetrated a fraud on the court. other judges found your statements to be "inexplicably misleading, patently incredible, totally inconsistent, and so disingenuous that the court is left with little confidence that the government can be trusted to tell the truth about anything." now, as ranking member, i ask the german to add a few extra rounds of questions today, because we each have five hours -- ask the chairman to add a few extra rounds of questions today because we each have five hours of questions and we have five minutes. that is insufficient to give voice to america's victims and survivors and answers about all of the corruption and coverups that we see at doj right now. we have one round, so we ask you politely but firmly, madame attorney general, please, do not waste one second of our precious

time by evading questions, by changing the subject, or engaging in personal attacks against members of congress. we saw your performance in the senate and we are not going to accept that. this is in a game. in the senate you brought something with you called a burn book, a binder of smears to attack members personally for doing the people's work of oversight. please, set the burn book aside and answer questions. when you here as reclaim your time, it is time for you to stop speaking. when we reclaim our time that means you stop. if you don't, we will ask the chair to stop the clock and let you go on his time. the quality of justice in america depends on the character of our government. please, do your job and bring the department of justice back from the brink. the survivors seated behind you and the american people watching everywhere deserve a department of justice worthy of its name. i yelled back. chair jordan: all of the opening statements will be included in the record.

we introduce the honorable pamela j bondi who served as the attorney general of the united states since february 5, 20 25 previously served in the office of the white house counsel, two terms as the florida attorney general, and 18 years as a prosecutor. we welcome our witness and thank her for appearing today. we will begin by swearing you in. will you please rise and raise your right hand? do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the testimony you are about to give his true and correct to the best of your knowledge, information, and beliefs so help you god? let the record show the witness answered in the affirmative. you can be seated. your written testimony will be entered into the record in its entirety. accordingly, we ask you summarize your testimony. madame attorney general, you may begin. ag bondi: thank you. thank you, chairman jordan, ranking member raskin, distinguished members of this committee. thank you for hosting me here today. i'm grateful for the opportunity to answer your questions,

highlight the work of our department, and discuss the most important topic of law, keeping the american people safe. a little over a year ago i was sworn into office as the 87th attorney general of the united states. i came into office with the goal of refocusing the department of justice on its core mission after years of bloated bureaucracy and political weaponization. the department of justice's core mission is to fight violent crime, protect the american people, and defend the rule of law above all else. while our work is never done, we have made tremendous progress to make america safe again. in 2025 we saw the lowest murder rate in 125 years. that is nothing short of historic. if you compare 2025 to 2024, here's what you will find peer the murder rate is down 20 1%,

robbery down 23%. carjacking down 40 3%, gonna assault down 22%, assault, burglary, i could go on. crime is declining. this did not happen by accident. the numbers tell an important yet straightforward story. president trump has given us the resources, the support, and the leadership to protect the american people. president trump's policies have saved lives. i cannot think of a policy outcome more important than protecting the lives of american citizens, can you? this trend has been especially clear in washington, d.c. and in memphis, two iconic american cities that spent years in the grip of horrific violent crime. the department of justice surged law enforcement resources and results came quickly. crime plummeted in both cities.

i want to make one point loud and clear. we achieved those results by working with democratic mayors. public safety does not have a party registration. when your constituents call 911, they don't ask for political views of the responding officer. they ask for help. i have federal agents in each and every one of your districts. they are here to help and i am here to help. many cities and states have worked with us and taken advantage of our federal support. some have not. meanwhile, a few elected officials have declared they are "at war" with the federal government and encouraged widespread obstruction of law enforcement. this has resulted in affordable clashes -- in avoidable clashes on the streets. we have seen rioters storming a

christian church. citizens and law enforcement officers have both been endangered by reckless rhetoric. we have made dozens of arrests in and around minneapolis so far, and many of them could have been avoided by simple compliance with federal law. of course, our efforts reach beyond our urban centers. we are striking crucial blows against terrorist organizations such as ms 13, the cartel, and antifa. as we sit here, i think you've seen the news this morning, the news is reporting that cartel drones are being shot down by our military. that's what we all should care about right now. protecting america. as we seek to dismantle these

drug trafficking networks that poison americans, in 2025 our dea agents seized more than 47 million fentanyl pills and more than 9800 total kilos of fentanyl, representing 369 potentially deadly doses that can kill americans. meanwhile, our attorneys are fighting for president trump's agenda in courtrooms across this country. this administration has been sued 627 times. we fought through a nonstop flood of bad faith temporary restraining orders from liberal activist judges across this country. america has never seen this level of coordinated judicial opposition towards a presidential administration. it is not only an unlawful

attack on the executive branch's authority but a serious attack on the democratic process. in spite of this unprecedented judicial activism, we have 124 unfavorable ruling that the u.s. supreme court, dockets and more to come. we had done so why did the weaponization of the prior administration by dropping prosecution, exposing the arctic fraud scandal and discussion congressional disclosure in the justice in this country. to address the obscene files hundred and 500 attorneys and reviewers spent thousands of hours painstakingly reviewing millions of pages to comply with congress is law we released more

than 3 million pages including 180,000 images all to the public while doing our very best in the timeframe allotted by the to protect victims. if you got us a victim's name that was released we immediately redacted it. all members of congress, as you know are invited to visit d.o.j. to see for yourself. i want to take a moment to acknowledge epstein survivors who appear didn't i'm a career prosecutor and despite what the ranking member set i spent my entire career fighting for dems and i will continue to do so. i am deeply sorry for what any victim, any victim has been through especially at the result of the monster read if you have

any information want to share with on parchment about anyone who has hurt you or abuse you are waiting the fbi is waiting to hear from you now. i want you to know any accusation of criminal wrongdoing will be taken seriously and investigated, the department of justice is committing criminal to holding criminals accountable to the fullest extent of the law. in 2025 the fbi arrested over 1700 child predators, a 10% increase from 2024, we also located 2700 victims of child exploitation and shut down .3.8 million dark web pedophile accounts and 3.8 million, please

if you have information to share that needs to be investigated, contact the fbi. today i look forward to discussing further our shared obligation to protect the american people, uphold the rule of law and keep the nation safe. thank you. >> thank you, madam attorney general we have a five minute rule they recognize the gentleman from california. madam general, thank you for your extensive remarks particularly on your continued investigation of those responsible over the years in the epstein debacle. obviously you have an amazingly full docket between civil rights, between criminal and white-collar crime and doing so as a chairman in a time when you and the president are under attack in ice ages and fbi are

under attack when they tried and priscilla. i want to personally apologize for those who would embolden, support or even stand with the lawbreakers that sit on this and congress. my job generally is to talk about trademarks is a chairman of the subcommittee and i will forgo that today the creation and maintenance of article three judges i work with the chief justice that and were trying to extend the and there only 677 district court judges they have variable dockets as well let you create a tremendous amount judges particularly immigration judges and you do so to save the court but adjudicating as is a

requirement of each of those people who claim right to be here in the united states and that has been going on under republican and democratic administration four years. what is unique about the trump administration this time that you and president trump managed to reduce the backlog of people seeking not for the first time in decades, you are getting ahead of the tremendous backlog for better or worse the release of millions of people with little pieces of paper saying come back later women call you and often to no avail when you call. i want to congratulate you, you might not take credit for and the other side would not give you credit for. i hope you continue to do that and i say so for a region most of his hearing will be about

minneapolis and other places in which the backlog of criminal aliens including my home state of california people who hurt other people and victimize their community is extensive and although the overall number maybe going on because of my places of homestay california your unable to apprehend people that my shares want apprehended, they want to cooperate in prohibited by law it is this committee's opinion on this side of the aisle that you should be given the ability to the man participation in the release of a noncriminal not be considered to be acceptable because the stately city has declared itself a century. one thing i think is been misunderstood. you create and maintain those

judges that adjudicate these cases. you also support so many that in fact have to make decisions as judges. knowing the limitation so feel article three judges are there, educate those that seem to miss the point that article one judges including bankruptcy judges and immigration judges and lots of people with the title appropriately judged do fact issue document that look like, act like and normally accepted as warrants and subpoenas and demand for state officials to stand aside and allow the production of either an individual or document. i think people are missing the point that the ice retainers and retainers and someone they act

like they're nothing and in the ordinary court madam general you do in fact have article one judges is out and they are respected normally. >> thank you for talking about all the great judges and i could add one thing we are always accrued and looking for judges, please reach out to our office for these judges for handling these important matters. as immigration judges. we are continuing to do that that we are always seeking qualified lawyers as well to be part of that, thank you for highlighting that. >> thank you. i yield back. >> the general lady from washington thank you,

mr. chairman good morning attorney general barr, we are joined by thousands of survivors from jeffrey epstein horrific tech snack trafficking ring they have shown and cut about courage in speaking out and demanding more from accountability to bring the creditors and pedophiles. absolute files transferred he act required your department of justice to disclose the perpetrators connected with epstein's criminal activity and readapt the information of survivors to protect their identity. let me show you what actually happened law. first annihilation of the long your department showed a pattern i've redacted the name of powerful predators. behind me is one example of a e-mail from epstein to a man whose name was reactive. the e-mail reads where are you, are you okay, i loved the

torture video. only after members of congress demanded that we see the unredacted file to the world that we learned the name of this individual, the chairman and ceo of a company financial ties to president trump business and personal ties to his advisor steve bannon. second the survivors were not similarly protected and also in violation of the law e-mail. here is another e-mail titled epstein victim we learn the names of survivors for their protection that your department of justice released this list of 32 survivor names with only one name reacted along with the newest file that disclose the names hundred e-mails and the addresses of survivors but also nude photographs and identities had been protected for decades

until your department released their name. survivors are telling their families are finding out for the first time that they were trafficked by in their words, this release does not provide closure, it feels like a deliberate attempt to intimidate survivors, punish those who came forward and reinforced same culture of secrecy that allowed epstein's crimes to continue for decades. to the survivors in the room were willing if you are willing, please stand. you are willing please raise your hand if you still have not been able to meet with this department of justice. please note for the record every single survivor has raised their hand. attorney general bondi, you

apologize to the survivors in your opening statement for what they went through at the hands of jeffrey appling. will you turn them now and apologize for what your department of justice has put them through that absolutely unacceptable release of the files and their information. >> congresswoman you for, merrick garland step right. >> attorney general bondi, i am going to became nighttime. >> attorney general answer. >> i would like an answer, will you turn to the survivors, this

is not about anybody that came before you, this is you taking responsibility for your department of justice and the harm that it is done to survivors who are standing right behind you and waiting for you to turn to them and apologize for what your department of justice. >> members answered and the way they want to answer. attorney general. >> that mr. chairman. >> because she does not like the answer. >> mr. chairman. >> i am reclaiming my. >> i'm not going to get in the gutter. >> lungs to the general lady she has 172nd. >> thank you. >> you are not going to answer the question. >> chairman i'll direct i'm answering the question. >> will you restore her time women is interrupting general lady from washington controls the time, the lady has 172nd

and you can proceed. >> what a massive cover-up this has been and continues to be, donald trump release been filed, the center of his political campaign because he thought it would benefit him and you got into office and claim to have a client list and that there was no, your deputy that alone ghislaine maxwell has returned to a minimum security prison and now you continue the cover-up and i wish he would turn around to survivors standing right behind you and human level. >> the chair recognizes for what you have done. >> i yield back. >> you have no time to yield back. we ate the thought. i would argue the central issue in the last election for the hearing order some in arizona and securing the border for five

minutes. >> figure mr. chairman and thank you attorney general bondi for being here today. in 2022 a french cement company play guilty in u.s. federal court participating in conspiracy with isis, that conspiracy contributed to the death of u.s. service members fighting in syria during operation inherent result. as part of the plea agreement more than $775 million to the d.o.j. access portraiture fund and library 2025 my colleagues and i sent you a letter urging the department for admission committed by the families of those service members including several of my constituents. previous a administration ignore these victims and i requested like they petitioned i'm resolved. my question for this on issue, you're willing to work to ensure the families that their petitions will be removed -- reviewed and brought to a

resolution. >> congressman we are aware and committed to doing everything that we can to support the victims and work with you, thank you for that question. >> i appreciate your answer. something that is pressing that i been working on for years this is section 702 and arctic cross training generate 2025 you testify before the u.s. senate and agreed with senator that anytime american citizen private medication is intercepted or restored or otherwise does communications are not researched without some showing of probable cause. you still have that view today i assume. >> at. >> during the most recent kaiser reauthorization i operated amendment to establish a clear warning for searches of american serving every publicly cited operational exception including the emergencies inquiries, cybersecurity threats and my intent was to share the department of justice to continue to keep america safe while also searches of the data.

are there any circumstances or exceptions you believe must be included to ensure d.o.j. can continue to operate effectively while still protecting american citizens data and privacy. >> congressman, we are committed to working with congress or weaponization and other misconduct by jack smith and others arctic cross, everything has happened under past administration. we are committed to working with you on that and we are working chairman jordan where the house and tell all with all of my fellow cabinet members resolving the issue. >> thank you i'm glad you brought up arctic trust, section 702 was used in the arctic trust investigation. information derived used by special counsel jack smith. my question has always been no

one's been able to answer this, what was the legal predicate for using a foreign intelligence authority in the arctic trust investigation. have you been able to ascertain any legal predicate. >> what i can tell you today it is been referred to my office, i cannot anything regarding that, it is very active and ongoing. >> you probably can't i really want to know section i 27 with members of congress and we know some level in an congressional staff which we know at some level day. her journalist or other u.s. persons not respecting in foreign nations that are caught up in that, can you answer that question and say whether quarries to cover this group. >> is a very active investigation with my office. however, i believe many members of congress stated that their

phones were part of arctic trust, we are well aware. we are taking this very seriously and is very active investigation. i'm going insane if any member of the democrat party happen to them we would take that justice. as we jump down and they should be jumping up and down screaming and supporting you and what you want to do because they should be a bipartisan issue. >> i hope it is a bipartisan issue and i'll leave with the last couple of questions which i'm sure have fallen to the same investigation, how many queries were conducted over all this is outside of arctic frost in the prior year by the fda and other intelligence community and

particularly we really need to know what was the legal standard, did they use probable cause did they use suspicion organ they have no individualized and gathering up information, that's beyond investigation with arctic frost i don't expect you to have that information but if you can help get that information we can understand the expensive nature of the misuse of 702 would be very get really helpful. >> it was expensive. thank you. >> the time has expired the general lady from texas. >> i ask unanimous consent to enter into the record el paso airspace reopened after faa quickly spent ten days that resending the tribune on february 11, 2026 and is as it was because of an impasse with dod over the. >> without objection without objection.

>> without objection. >> point of order mr. i didn't hear back about the question i assume that's not happening i want to ensure the members on my side. >> point of order every member. >> five minutes. >> with the witness. >> will there be five minutes? >> window witness, okay very good. are you up next. >> the gentlewoman new york is i want to begin by acknowledging the survivors of jeffrey absolute abuse who are in the room with us today, i want to thank all of you your bravery and speaking out and i want to say you and the other survivors with the heinous crimes deserve better from this department of justice. particular it's shocking the department did not read the names of those victims but it did read that the names of the abusers we don't know whether this was done of incompetent or whether it was deliberate malaysia.

by the way is completely unacceptable. the d.o.j. failed to bring any of these to justice or. instead engaged in pursuit of donald trump received enemies. we want to focus on one example. attorney general of my home state of new york led to show james comer she has been held that on securing an indictment against ms. james for something, anything because she held donald trump companies accountable for years and financial fraud. in that apartment manufacturing investigation against the alleged mortgage fraud. the attorney leading the investigation erik siebert trump and pointy, refuse to bring charges against ms. james because they were simply no evidence. forcibly the prosecutor to do trump's bedding has no place in the d.o.j. so he was forced out. trump did not contain the theory that he expressed social media post addressed to you by name.

i am sure you have seen, i fired him and there is a great case and then we moved down, you cannot delay any longer, stealing a reputation and credibility. impeach me twice and indicted me five times over nothing, just as must be served now. obviously he followed the order. lindsey halligan trump's difference lawyer who had never prosecuted a case in her life prosecuted mr. sieber and the mandate wesley go after ms. james comer now that we saw an indictment mrs. halligan was illegally put into the route. the department was. not once, but twice to indict attorney general james court, both juries rejected you for misuse of indictment, it's practically unheard of for a young jury to refuse an indictment. 2016 happen and over 150,000

offenses. we to you that happen twice in the same week, to the court that must've been humiliated. now the reports are continuing to investigate, the amount of retargeting attorney james comer month of investigation, multiple failed indictment to this found your own prosecutors told you there was not enough evidence to support a conviction. it is clear you are going after simply because he held president trump accountable and he wants to punish her. this is why name on the long list trump's enemies that d.o.j. is targeting from jerome powell and lisa cook at the federal reserve, james comey, numerous democratic members of congress, john brennan, jack, democratic officials in minnesota and mourn, those are just the ones we know about reading contrast he's politically motivated and that recitation and it's something they can charge their

enemies with, we have evidence of criminality revealed in the files. i really have one question for you, how many epstein co-conspirators have you indicted, how many perpetrators are you investigating. >> first. >> how many have you indicted. >> i'm going to answer the question. >> i'm going to answer the question, i want to answer the question. >> i'm not going to get in the got her with these people but i'm going to answer the question. >> how many are you and guiding. >> reclaiming my time i think it interesting that he talked about indicted, the president talked about being indicted. >> here we go.

>> the gentleman from new york we will give you will do that. when you ask a question, you may not like the answer. >> the question how many epstein's they don't like the answer because it is honest. he asking for minute question and i am going to. >> not on our lot, not on our time, no way. i told you don't tell me. >> i saw what you did not even a lawyer. >> 45 seconds. >> we will give you my second. 45 seconds. >> i'm timing right now. >> i reclaim my time, the answer to my question how many coking e-readers have indicted r0, you been attorney general for a whole year, the d.o.j. fired the lead prosecutor this case that

evidence of this entire time and claimed falsely last july there were no more and it's taking congress to release apps team files and when you did you included personal information about the victim on protecting the names of the users. >> the gentleman's time has expired time has expired. >> it's clear under your leadership. i back, the gentleman yields back. >> may i answer. >> our next question is going to give you time to respond to all kinds of things. we will return to the gentleman from texas for five minutes. >> miss bonding you go ahead i'm right over here. the time is yours. >> thank you. first brought up the president lane they indicted me tried, they sure that they tried to teach him twice and you

mr. nadler were one of the lead on that, i was on the other side i let that with you you said the president conspired and forward in a interference in the 26 robert mueller found no evidence evidence, done in 2016, have you apologize to president trump? have you apologize to president trump all of you that participated in the impeachment hearings against donald trump, you should all be apologizing. you attack the president and i am not going to have it and i'm not going to put up with it. all they want to do, the american people need to know that, they are talking about epstein today, this has been around since the obama administration, this administration released over 3 million pages of documents, over 3 million and donald trump signed that long to release all of those document.

he's the most transparent president in the nation's history and none of them asked merrick garland over the last four years one word about jeffrey epstein, how ironic is that, do you know why, donald trump, the dow right now is over $50000, i don't know why you're laughing, the dow is over 50000 right now almost 7000 those are records in american retirement savings are booming, that's what we should be talking about, we should be talking about making americans safe. what does the dow have to do anything that's what they just asked, are you kidding.

>> mr. jordan, the committee will be in order, mr. jordan am i going to get 45 seconds added to my time. >> the committee will be in order the time is a gentleman from texas and the attorney general can respond. >> thank you. >> the dow has shattered 50000 for the first time, this is crazy they said it could not be done and four years by president trump won has done it in one year, the national median rent has fallen to a four-year low thanks to donald trump. that is why they want to focus on epstein in the most transparent president in the nation history. the murder rate has plummeted to 120 five-year low thanks to donald trump for an unprecedented nine straight

months euro there were 0 illegal border crossings at the southern border. that's what we should be focused on, all the great work that this president has done and will continue to do to keep america safe and make americans safe. >> thank you attorney bondi i agree with you i thank you got a fine job in the democrats should be apologizing to the epstein victims to doing nothing to the four years they were running the government. we did not hear about this it took you and president trump finally provide transparency and giving answers to the american people and i want to thank you for that. i want to thank you for standing up for truth and fighting back against the theatrics and the time that you will endure over the next hour or two and i when i apologize for my colleagues, they're not all that bad but they have to put on a show and i'm sorry you have to go through that.

i would like to yield the last 80 seconds that i have 80 seconds since i was so rudely interrupted and i'll give all 80 seconds to chairman jordan. >> i would yield to the attorney general if if she has anything to add. >> i'm trying to get. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman yields back, the chair recognizes the lady from california. >> i would notice mr. nadler has not been answered and i when asked out of respect to the american public and the epstein survivors some of whom are here today and we could have a transparent conversation and get the public the answers they deserve. i want to briefly direct your attention to two documents i hope you will put on the screen. in the first in individual e-mail with jeffrey epstein asking if the woman identified

as in and epstein respond she was a civilian. in the second e-mail epstein rights to leave tisch about a ukrainian girl noting she was a little freaked out by the age difference and stating he will try to convince her not to return to ukraine and then he instructs mr. tisch to call him that i don't like records of these conversations. i would like to ask straightforward question that is a yes or no answer. do these e-mails constitute credible evidence, not proof that capital evidence with further investigation into whether steve tisch was involved in epstein's criminal conduct, do you think yes or no. >> i'm not going to play i guess or no game not answer the question to the best of my ability. we will look and investigate any

case involving any victim, i'm not familiar there were 3 million pages with that e-mail that we will look into anything, the document had been released, 3 million, the redacted version we left them open for all of you. i believe you being. >> can i issue, i'm not be. >> i only have five minutes. >> i only have 30 seconds based on your filibuster. >> let me just go further. director patel testified in this committee room that there was no cannibal information indicating that epstein trafficked victims to anyone else. and glancing at the documents that's proof, that is not the case. in july your department issued a memo stating it investigated the epstein files including no additional individuals would be charged.

i did go over to the department of justice yesterday and 400 all 35 members are in the house computer and there is for computers. it would take many months to actually have the time i only had a few hours. i think the transparency argument is a sham. >> did you have to wait. >> not possible to go in. i did however, see the u.s. attorney information for the southern district of new york indicating there were additional survivors and a probable co-conspirator, other members of congress had uncovered likely co-conspirators whose names were blocked out. the epstein file transparency act which all but one member that the house voted for the president signed requires the department to release everything except what needs to be redacted to protect the victim or an

ongoing prosecution which apparently there is not from the testimony that we had received. i am concerned that this act has not been fully complied with. when director came to the committee he admitted i thousand fbi agent had gone through the files and redacted president trump's name from them. it is pretty clear that what is been transmitted from the fbi continues to redact president trump's name even though he is mentioned thousands of times in the quiet. i think the credibility of the department with the act has been damaged and i think the department's credibility has been damaged in other ways all all. we all saw the horrible video of american citizens being killed

by i.c.e. agents and minneapolis. i think how the department handled these cases with the department state and local police in minnesota got a court order to get access to the crime scene to be properly preserved by federal agents, the agents to find the court order ended up archery from general policy the d.o.j. is not collaborating with state and local nonpersonal and i think that is a disgraceful approach to the homicide of american citizens really and it really does nothing to bring credit to your department. i will yell that. >> may i answer. >> i find it interesting that he points after president trump the greatest president in history and if they can maintain their composure this is a hearing and

i find it interesting that they go after donald trump she doesn't say how much money she gave to read hoffman and nor. >> regular order please. >> we point out -- the committee will be in order. >> point of order. >> when a witness attacks. >> it's not about point of order. >> please let her speak mr. chairman let's at regular order. >> you gotta state the rules. >> i'm trying to make a point of order. >> what are you referring to. >> without responding to a question that attacked me personally it's pathetic she can't answer the question. >> the point of order the gentleman from wisconsin is recognized.

>> in august of last year i sent a letter to the departed of justice asking for assistance and compensation for the town in my district and your office replied there was an ongoing matter unable to comment on it which i understand is just fine. i want to set this up as a reminder, three years ago at this time of year that four roads were blockaded in the town and the temperature was 25 below 0 people had to park their cars and neighbors place and take the snowmobile across the lake to get the car and drive into town there were people 80 and 90 years old that were very concerned of emergency medical services. in the perpetrators of this the tribe out there they demanded compensation from the town i would call it extortion, they ultimately got $600,000 and it

took beside the perpetrators who close those roads off in the biden a administration made it clear to the town that we are not on your side in regards to this, and the federal judge said no this is wrong what happened in the roads should be left open and continue to be left open. my question are you willing to work with my office and with the town to further investigate this matter and seek compensation from the tribal government after their extortion of $600,000 from this little town in northern wisconsin. >> congressman you do a great job representing your district and we would more than welcome working with you and we are familiar with that investigation. >> i would add were highlighting

the miscarriages of justice in the previous a administration this is another one of the small examples no different than the catholic diocese and many others that you told so many other times here's another instance of what they did to a small town and nearly bankrupted them as a result fortunately there was a federal judge that saw through it and fixed it. i want to move on to fraud enforcement you established a fraud division is not correct. >> yes congressman. >> has a new division begun any investigation and getting after those individuals that have committed the rampant fraud that we have seen in minnesota. >> it's not only rampant in minnesota it's rampant throughout this country much as it is in california as you know and other places. we are working on it actively our criminal fraud division has been working on it.

we are expanding that the vice president idea to come up with an amazing separate fraud division which we are establishing and going nonstop not only to expose the fraud in minnesota but around the country and taxpayer dollars that a been stolen from the american people, we are committed to recovery that money and holding those people accountable. >> i would remind everyone why did this happen to minneapolis why did federal law enforcement have to go to minneapolis because industrial fraud it was an assistant united states attorney that said this is industrial scale fraud that is going on in minnesota at this point i sent a letter to our governor in wisconsin right across the border in my district is only 20 miles for the city of minneapolis and i asked him to open the books for a federal audit on foodstamp and medicaid,

don't you think it would be a good idea for every governor to do that at this point. >> it protects the citizens and i can't understand why that's not happening. i do think that is a great idea happening around the country. when our new division is established it is established when colin is confirmed he is amazing, when that is established we will work on both sides of the aisle that's what we want to do to stop fraud to every city in every state in this country, we will continue to fight for the american people. >> you would encourage every governor across the united states after what we have seen in minnesota and what we know is happening in other states, you mention california, you would agree every gather should avail themselves of federal resources to make sure this industrial scale fraud is rooted out to protect the taxpayers of the

united states. is that correct. >> absolutely. >> mr. chairman the gentleman from tennessee is recognized. >> first i would like to thank you for holding the hearing in the proper fashion as you have secondly i would like to think other victims of the epstein case who have come here every doing it and being brave and try to move this i apologize i can't do it. i am from memphis and memphis does have a task force there the memphis task force has been operating for several months and we do have a democratic mayor paul young and he is not against the task force but he's against ice bni memphis and he's not favor of the national guard, i concur on those positions, the dea being there and alcohol tobacco firearms in the fbi and other ways is good for memphis crime has gone down in memphis but it went down 25% before the task force got there under the

direction of director davis, chief davis. it's content about 15% more sense then. that is good i would like to comment mexico city's homicide rate has gone down 40% during the same time when memphis had already gone down 25% that is not necessarily because of the task force although the mayor says he thinks it's helped. i thank you for that. you would agree that violent crime and communities across our country is important that's why the taskforces there is that not true? >> if i add to that the fbi are fbi under director patel did a search in memphis prior to the task force. thank you for saying that about mayor young he has been great to work with. >> he is a good guy. >> he is a very good guy. one problem where we are and

priorities. a recent department of justice faced arrest record in texas and california found undocumented immigrants are less then half as likely as americans arrested for homicide. this pattern holds for assault, robbery, burglary and half as likely for drug offense. i ask you and i bring to you about this, the ads that run that say to local law enforcement specifically are you tired of having your hands handcuffed because you can't do the things you wanted to do and if you buddy do something different to join i said no get a 50000-dollar bonus and will pay off your student debts and will help your pensions et cetera. they are encouraging local law enforcement to lead local law enforcement and work for ice, we need people working in the top lines of local law enforcement to protect our citizens from the worst of the worst and they are

committing crimes that hurt our citizens in our city, you're working against it, thank you for that, by train to get the local law enforcement where we have an undercount of officers to lead and deport people is a nonpriority wire we tried to get people and policeman working on the frontline to lead the frontline intake the $50000 and work for ice instead of working to fight the worst of the worst. i've not seen that commercial or that add and i would argue we need strong people in both local law enforcement and state law enforcement and all of our federal agent working together. i've seen some of the worst of the worst violent criminals who are in this country illegally we both know that. in memphis working hand in hand

i want to stick with memphis and your mayor and what you discussed there has been nearly 6000 arrest as of february 8 and i thank you agree with this. in your district and almost 600 gang members what we found in memphis a lot of the gangs are local gangs but 600 gang members. 148, 148 missing children were recovered in 1000 illegal guns were seized there are questions about those children and the different things. ice is running rampant and you're not investigating and they killed and ms. good that was an execution and you did not investigate it, you try to investigate ms. good's widow and

you try to investigate alex pretti they were executed by kristi noem executed her dog, that was wrong, you can investigate those people and investigate anybody who uses a weapon and federal civil rights violation. we will keep going the chairs record ice for five minutes and i way that trip is on someone else are you? you cannot do that you have a right to petition the government under the first amendment that does not mean you can come into this room and start screaming at mr. raskin or me or anybody else in the congressional hearing in younger right to protest on the street but that doesn't give you right to go into the capital and disrupt congress that these guys talk about every day you cannot do that when don lemon said he was exercising his first amendment prepress rights, freedom of the press rights that is not accurate he was trampling

on other individual rights, is that true? we will always protect our insurances in the freedom of religion and that is accurate. >> every commitment and under the federal government. isn't it true that mr. lemon that at a shopping center with the rioters who inner-city church in st. paul that with them prior to marching to the church. >> he did meet this is a pending case i will only stick to what is in the four corners of the unsealed indictment if i could chairman. a lot more will come out, under the four corners of the indictment, yes he did data operation called operation pullout they were gearing for resistance and met in a parking

lot in a caravan to a church on a sunday morning and people were worshiping together. >> mr. lemon said he lifestream before entering the church with the rioters, then he said we're going to head to the operation he said on camera, isn't that right. >> yes chairman and more. >> he was in minnesota and they were gearing up for an operation. again you cannot do that that's why this is so important that this guy be held accountable and that's why you have charged him and indicted him. moving to the second subject will john brennan be indicted, mr. brennan lied to the committee, you are not supposed to do last congress will be deposed him 1001 he lied to the committee and the committee and the congress would like to know if in fact he will be indicted, here's why it's important i'll give you a chance to respond here's right so important it

wasn't that he lied to us it's what he lied about any of i to us about the dossier and specifically what role the dossier played in the intelligence community assessment. we know back when president trump was first elected first term this is when it started to the impeachment the jack smith and all the stuff in the last decking but it began here any lie to congress about the role he played it i want to read a couple of things during the deposition before i give you a chance to respond. mr. brennan when asked the question, the cia was not involved with the dossier. he said it was their purview the fbi said not ours, he also said the cia was opposed to having any reference or inclusion of the steele dossier in the intelligence community assessment. that is interesting, he classified information that was

declassified this past summer by the cia and says entirely different, john brennan i want to put this up brennan formalize his position stating this is released by the cia director ratcliffe, my bottom line that information has been included in the report he was further asked by a cia official the same officer and refused to remove it and it wasn't good and he said yes but doesn't ring true, this is john brennan using the document to change intelligence assessment which i think led to all the stuff that we seen over the last decade and i think this committee in the country congressman would like to know if mr. brehm it under brennan is going to be indicted. >> what i can confirm we have

received a referral from you chairman jordan to investigate john brennan his attorney made public statements but the department is still bound by our long-standing policy of not discussing matters. what i will say today i cannot confirm nor deny whether there is a pending investigation but no one is above the law. >> weaponization has ended. >> point of order. >> gentleman from new york is reckonings. >> we want to know whether mr. brennan will be indicted we should ask the president. not point of order but trying to make it one, the gentleman from georgia is recognized. >> thank you, mr. chairman general bondi it's been reported that 1000 personnel assigned to the task of identifying and

scrubbing donald trump's name from the epstein files. were those reports accurate. >> i believe his name has adhered countless times from the documents. >> i'm get every jew. >> i asked whether or not it was true that it was 1000 folks who were assigned at task where those reports accurate? >> there are more than 500 attorneys and reviewers i cannot give you an exact number. >> i want to ask about that. a different question there were 500 d.o.j. lawyers and others assigned the task of reacting

the appropriate information including identities of the epstein victim survivors on the epstein file prior to their release, 500 is that correct. >> if i could finish my answer there were more than 500 attorneys and reviewers consistent. >> that answers my question. >> that answers my question. i'm going to move on. >> this is ridiculous. >> the time belongs to the gentleman from georgia. >> would you agree your eight years of service of the state of florida attorney general the third largest state in the nation served as an excellent preparation for your current role as attorney general for the united states of america. >> not only that i was a career prosecutor for 18 years. for 18 years.

>> don't ask a question if you don't want to answer. >> 18 years you constituted the serious felony cases including drug cases. >> i prosecuted homicide i prosecuted capital cases i prosecuted domestic violence cases and multiple cases and that's why i feel for all of the victims and merrick garland. you also prosecuted sexual assault cases and child sex trafficking cases, correct? >> i answer that question earlier. i prosecuted multiple. bottom line. >> mr. chairman will you reminder of the rules the time belongs to the member of the committee. >> are you an experience prosecutor, correct. >> i think we establish that. >> yes or no. >> as he wanted answer or not.

>> i want to yes or no answer. >> all leave with what you already said. let me ask you this question. >> the prosecution of sexual assault cases you are acutely aware of how important it is to protect the identity of victims of sexual assault, correct. >> i have addresses multiple times. i think others were cutting me off. >> i simply asked are you aware that the fact that it's vitally important to protect the identity of sexual assault victims as you prosecute the people they accused of assaulting them, am i correct. >> as we have said multiple times. >> protection of all victims are protected you are protected. you an answer you want me to

interrupt. >> you not answering the question you're doing a jekyll and hyde routine i want you to answer my question. >> what is jekyll and hyde mean. >> you're nice to the republicans and you turn like a hide on democrats. let me ask you this we have the epstein victim survivors here today representative jaya pasta question if you would be so kind and honorable tittered around and faced them and apologize to them for outing them, how much how many lives have been derailed because of your department that was sloppy and incompetent or willfully. your time is up. >> which wasn't the time of the

government has expired the judgment yields back, the chair reckonings is a gentleman from wisconsin for five minutes. attorney general bondi my colleagues on the other side of the aisle has spent this past several months attacking demonstration for doing what that america people want when they elected president trump i find a bit ironic this is the same party just a few years ago were openly criminal illegal aliens wreak havoc on the american communities. have a short video i want to play. >> we are a nation of laws undocumented workers with our immigration laws that must be how the cannibal. >> they committed a crime no questions asked they are gone, no great mention can be in a

position whether they can't control their borders. >> we need to address the issue of immigration and we don't want anymore committing. >> every place in this country is rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country and the jobs that they hold might be held by citizens or illegal immigrants in the public service that they use impose burdens on our taxpayers that's why our administration has moved aggressively to secure our borders more by hiring a record number of border guards by deporting twice as many criminal aliens ever before, by cracking down on illegal and borrowing welfare benefits to illegal aliens. >> illegal immigration is wrong play and in simple when we use phrases like i document your workers is not serious about combating illegal immigration which the american people

overwhelmingly oppose. if you don't they get the legal your knocking to say it, i thicket is illegal and wrong you have people all over the world i don't thicket something we can do at this point. >> would you allow the city state nor the federal law. >> no. >> recently could not allow people to pour into the united states undetected, undocumented, unchecked answer combating the line of people who are waiting patiently and diligently and lawfully into come immigrants in this country the trump a administration d.o.j. doing to end the open border policies of the prior administration that's all dangerous drug think about aliens clutter community. >> congressman, president trump

worked tirelessly as you know to close our border which is what the democrats asked in that video president trump close the borders on day one he has protected americans, he is protecting our kids from the influx of drugs that were flowing into this country under mexico that fentanyl precursor from tried on these precursors were taken from china into mexico. mexico they were mixed and taken into our country along with gang members in ms 13, tda and our cities and around our country thanks to joe biden open border policy and has stopped under donald trump it will no longer happen under this administration and he is doing everything to keep americans safe.

let me continue when he was elected overwhelmingly by the american people the majority of the american people wanted donald trump and the main reason was border security and keeping americans safe, that is exactly what he did and that's why today the other side said tear, they yell and cut me off and they want to ask a question but don't want answers because they want to distract from other great things that this president and this a administration working hand in hand and that includes secretary no who has closed our borders and tom homan who has closed our borders to keep americans safe and they're going to keep it because or not they do it they american people are smarter than that and they see through their theatrics. >> thank you, yesterday senator grassley reached out to my office that i was what of the 20 members that i was now disclosed and under surveillance for jack

smith. and this brings up not disclose orders and whether or not they should apply to members of congress. with my phone records being surveilled in 19 other members of congress i'm just wondering how d.o.j. views that. >> the time is expired but the general lady can respond. >> as i stated earlier anyone illegally obtained democrat or republican we will fight vigorously to stop that anything in arctic frost i cannot discuss right now. >> is it true the d.o.j. pay change of policy you cannot do that now the d.o.j. is knocking to do that and ask for the judge for in indio that in itself tells us how wrong it was, the chair reckonings is a gentleman from california. >> madam attorney general you acknowledged earlier to mr. johnson that president trump was mentioned in the release countless times in the epstein files. i would a play a video that

speaks to the frustration that many of these victims have. trump's name appears in the files and it could be a thousand times, is that right. >> the number is a total misleading factor. >> we have not released anyone's name in the epstein files that is not incredible. we released every piece of information you can characterize the numbers however, you want it. >> i need my time. >> it sound like if you don't know the number it could be a thousand times. >> it is night. >> is a 500 time. >> is it a hundred times. >> what is a number. >> i don't know. >> i understand why the victims are frustrated. attorney general acknowledged what mr. patel would not acknowledge it was way more than a thousand times. i want to move to weaponization of government and yesterday it was reported that six members of

congress had indictments against him and they were not returned by a grand jury, my colleagues have spoken about their frustration of being and subpoenas and cell phone records comb through preet in 2017 to 2018 adam schiff and i had her fell cell phone records come through not by you but a different a private of justice under the president and retaliation for our role in the interference campaign and respect her general would find this improper and the predicate was absurd. in 2020 after sitting on two committees that were part of the president's first impeachment in fbi agent leaked my cooperation in the national security case where it was targeted, the president fbi leadership authorized to statements to the press that said i was never suspected of wrongdoing and only help investigation but that did not stop the death threats or may gop colleagues for referring to an ethics investigation were kevin mccarthy's chairman on the ethics committee would find the

same thing as fbi the current fbi director would write a book on government gangsters and identify a long list of enemies without a quarter of them either investigated or indicted and he listed me at the very top along with adam schiff and during the same testimony refused to recuse himself when asked if he would recuse if any case came across his desk involving people on the list. since the testimony his department has put me under investigation with editorship for the nonsense mortgage fraud cases that were seen. i get it this is what the president has done i price today we have a bingo card and what will come next. i expected and i did not expect this would happen i would like your help on it the president has inspired death threats against me and sitting up here with me. in june 2025 an individual left 11 voicemails on a district

office on the voicemails they said get the message to him i'm going to hunt him down, that [bleep] antacids gate over the golden bridge by my [bleep] self that a probative justice in the northern district of california declined to process. on may 14, 2025 on twitter responding to something i posted an individual said it was not erik and now i'm going to kill you. that a probative justice from the southern district of texas declined to prosecute may through december of 2025 we received messages that said i hope somebody shoot you and your children and your wife in the head, pew pew [bleep] [bleep] that a private of justice has not charges individual and cited that he is a prolific color and has health conditions, what we found in our ongoing investigation and is voicemails that he employed others to do this the president can come after me, that is fine i am in the arena so were these folks

you never expected that the departed of justice would not seek to investigate those who are making threats against us and that would include those on that side of the aisle i'm asking for your help to protect life because it's at risk with environment we are in right now. >> congressman i completely agree with you. i know several of those personally involving you i believe one has been charge publicly and there is something i would be happy to talk about off-camera and i can assure you they are very serious and there be and looked into and i can give you more details, none of you should be threatened ever not have your children should be threatened, not every families should be threatened, you can come into my office any day i will work with all of you on both sides of the aisle if you are ever threatened and i'll

gladly talk to you after this hearing about your case. i can tell you some of them are very active. >> we appreciate what the attorney general said and i think some of the things that the judgment from california that can relate to its unfortunately strong as they said and we appreciate the help to get the justice department. with that we would not recognize the gentleman from new jersey mr. vander. >> thank you, chairman i don't know where to begin thank you for being here general. i have to mention this first i use this word before my friends on the other side of the aisle with hypocrisy, epstein, epstein, epstein, for years on the other side of the aisle we heard nothing, crickets, not a word nothing was said when they were in control, nothing was

mentioned with last summer in the ranking member points out that he did do something last year, he did a letter complaining about the plea deal for maxwell but it was not a big deal, then we get a doing administration and all the sudden it's a big deal and they seemed concerned, they were upset and investigating they had all these years and all this time and in fact we all know that name when they had a congressional hearing in the democratic member were taking taxed on questions to ask to go after trump epstein was using our democratic colic to go after trump and then we talk about ice how horrible they were concerned everybody wants everything to go right, nobody ever wants to see somebody die and they complain a better but that the same time and encourage constituents to go after the i.c.e. agents to

challenge them, to hurt them to attack them and that does not make sense. we hear about the concern going after democrats a legal system that judiciary and that a probative justice is going after democrats. but they literally rework the legal system under alvin bragg and letitia james to go after republicans and those sympathetic to republicans. be careful when you accuse others when you're not guilty yourself be careful of what do you say because you have a history. i want to talk about where we are were and where we are now we had over 10 million illegal crossings in the past between 2020 and 24, over 10 million a much bigger number ambien conservative we were told the people were not dangerous but they were they were dangerous many of them more than 300 individuals on the terror watch list during that time violent

criminals came across as we saw consequences with mothers and fathers, daughters and son, children were raped, murdered, hurt, abused, beaten, trafficked off from drugs, my god, the drugs they brought to our babies in this country 73000 illegals with terminal history, 20000 with convictions of assault, robbery and sex offenses, 13000 convicted murderers and are beatable country 15000 convicted sexual assault offenders it was madness in insanity it is bizarre and perverse, what in god's name were you doing? , we finally are cleaning this up, we are finally trying to make it right and say for our people, my questions are this general do you believe in removing criminal illegal aliens from our community to save american lives. >> yes, given they cases that

you just discussed that was proof of it every single day president trump is committed to that, this entire cabinet is committed to that in making and keeping americans safe. >> inc. ever doing that would you agree that allowing individuals with known criminal histories to enter and remain at the united states we knew this back then, they knew it, would you agree that create seriousness to our public safety, let's say them clearly would you agree when dangerous individuals are released instead of detained and they were released over and over and over again, this is really what america cares about, they want their children and their families to be safe do you think if you release them instead of detaining them that crimes will happen because of that. >> absolutely. >> and it did. >> thank you. >> would you agree cooperation, this is a biggie and i'm good ask you to elaborate this is a

big deal some of the problems that we see and minnesota are happening that cooperation between federal and local enforcement which we always used to have helps to remove violent offenders from our communities that we should be 18. >> yes. >> can you elaborate on that. in other words when the local enforcement is forced by the politicians not to do their job and not cooperate, why does it create a situation that we see with crowd control, they are not peaceful they're not peaceful protesters and when you spit on law enforcement and you push them and you be there cards you can answer the question. >> the time is expired. that me answer the question. >> i spent four days myself and minnesota in minneapolis what i will say about some of the sanctuary cities some of these democratic cities law enforcement quietly want to work

with that. i've spoken to law enforcement in multiple cities who want to work with us and we will do everything that we can to keep our citizens safe whether or not these democrat-controlled sinks ray cities do or don't. >> that's what really matters. >> mr. chair i have a uc. thank you so much the approval rating imposed on the strong us issues and today 40% of people approve and border security welcome. >> without objection. >> now i recognize the gentleman from california. >> thank you attorney general bondi for being here today. i'm going to show you two photos

of former prince andrew prince andrew attended various parties with jeffrey epstein under the law of congress passed you are allowed to redirect photos to protect the victims of epstein's sex trafficking operation you rejected the photos of this victims face because you are following the congressional law, is that correct. >> i'm sorry that we redacted the victims. >> because you filed the congressional law. >> yes. >> you now establish, please put the photos back up that we are looking at a sex trafficking victim under the federal victims trafficking protection act not only is jeffrey epstein guilty but anyone who patronize us epstein's sex operation is also guilty of a crime that's why i

find absolutely despicable that you sought to protect epstein's clients like former prince andrew last july you close the case on epstein's abusers july 2025 memo from your to probative justice stated we did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties, these two photos, please put the photos back up these photos staring you in the face are evidence of a crime and more than enough evidence to predicate an investigation against former prince andrew i ask you attorney general pam bondi why did you shut down this investigation last july and why have you not prosecuted former prince andrew. >> i don't believe you asked merrick garland these questions when he was attorney general. >> i agree with you. i agree with you, i called

people looking at the epstein class, merrick garland dropped the ball as did attorney general bill barr and the whole string of failures you are in charge you have the power to change things and hold these met accountable and you're doing opposite in your protecting them i want to move on to another man donald trump. can i answer your question. >> you answer the question. >> you are saying no. i want to discuss another man donald trump was all over the obscene files like former prince, here is a video ♪ ♪ >> like former prince andrew donald trump attended various parties with jeffrey epstein. i want to know were there any under age girls at that party or

any party that trump attended with jeffrey epstein. >> this is so ridiculous they are trying to deflect from all the great things donald trump has done. there is no evidence that donald trump is committed a crime, everyone knows that this is a most transparent presidency. he is the one. >> i reclaim my time i got the answer, you have no evidence. >> the time belongs to the gentleman from california. >> i am going to put up another document from a witness who called the fbi national threat operation because i believe you just lied under oath, there is ample evidence in the epstein file. >> don't you ever accuse me of a crime. >> you lied under oath and this

is under videotape you said no evidence of a crime and i'm showing you here is a witness statement you called and to the fbi operation center he drove donald trump around and you overheard donald trump safety jeffrey on his cell phone he was so angry he was going to stop the limo and hurt donald trump and he met a girl who said she was raped by donald trump and jeffrey epstein, she later had her head blown off in the office at that could not a been suicide. no one at that affirmative justice interviewed this witness, you need to interviewed this wetness immediately epstein should run house in chouchou the man who patronize this. there are 1000 sex trafficking victims and you have not held a single man accountable, shame on you if you have any decency you would resign right after this

hearing. >> the time of the judgment has expired. >> may i respond. >> i don't how you respond. >> the crime in california he does not want to talk about crime. >> it will be in order, the gentleman's time the next witness would be more than happy to let the attorney general. >> the gentleman from alabama is reckoning for five minutes. >> thank you, congressman. this is what congressman lou did not want to talk about he did not want to talk about all the crime that is happening in his state and the dangerous sanctuary city policies and the refusal means california has released 4561 criminal illegal aliens criminal illegal aliens

onto a street in the crimes of these aliens include 31 homicides, 661 assaults, 574 burglaries, 184 robberies, 1489 dangerous drug offenses, 379 weapon offenses and 234 sexual predator offenses, that is why they are deflecting, that is why they're trying to talk about the obscene files, that is currently happening in his home state. attorney general thank you for being here i would make sure you had time to respond i'm an italian a little bit in october when you are testify before the senate in the infiltration of the illegal chinese apes

intercountry as a father i'm really worried about this and i believe many parents of the country share a similar concern can you provided update on the d.o.j.'s work in this space over the past few months. >> yes, thank you for bringing that up we are talking about this. they should be an issue where both sides of the aisle can work together on parents need to understand, children need to understand that so many are being manufactured in china and sent to our country and have the potential to be laced with lethal drugs. we've seen an overdose, we need to get on the front end of this before we have another crisis and children are dying i partnered with secretary kennedy at hhs on this matter thank you for bringing it up there selling these things as flavored vape's illegally around the country,

secretary kennedy and i went and did something on this and it was sadly the day charlie kirk was assassinated. it did not get a lot of attention nor should it have after that happened but yes we are continuing to work on that and thank you for bringing that up that is happening in all of our states i would ask everyone here it is happening in every state and not only are they laced with thc many of the vape's that they could be laced with fentanyl, i wish i could think of the state it was in but we had someone overdose and we have to get together on this and we have to get on the front end of this and i would love to work across the aisle on this to protect our kids, how many schoolkids do you see vaping and not only i believe a vape has 20 cigarettes that is one vape 20

cigarettes i believe it is the also what they could be laced with because so many the majority of them are manufactured in china. >> if you have any additional resources let us know as you want to process. eminent change gears one more time. under the biden administration there was confusion with parts of the d.o.j. trading software developers like financial institutions even when they did not hold or control anyone's money they were building the technology that uncertainty made it harder for americans to build and innovate earlier they share the deputy attorney general issued entitled to any regulation by prosecution a clear break from the biden a administration approach and i think it's important that's a good step in the right direction but can you talk how they d.o.j. is putting that memo into practice when it comes to making sure people are writing the software and don't control the users funds we don't want them treated as unlicensed there not many transmitters.

>> yes were doing everything that we can to protect the american people and i would refer everyone to deputy attorney general blanche memo where working as hard as we could. >> we want to lead the way on this based on that we appreciate the help. i yield back ten seconds. >> the gentleman yield back we recognize his own for unanimous consent. >> the gentleman may proceed. >> bombshell documents police called police about epstein in 2006 kamala harris defense that decision not to release the obscene files. >> without objection. >> why weren't they released during the biden a administration. >> without objection. >> house democrats stacy exchanged text during 2019 congressional hearing. >> without objection. >> it allows epstein victims claims to proceed. >> without objection. >> hakeem jeffries solicited by dated 2013 after the financier was convicted child sex competitor jeffrey abstain was

invited to a fund-raising dinner with working with brooklyn's barack. e-mail from leslie graff to jeffrey epstein concerning hakeem jeffries fundraising. >> epstein files as biden was replaced in 2019? >> without objection . . .

then we have adults with children who were, boys and girls who will live in silence for the rest of their lives. i believe the epstein files are just one of many sex crimes taking place in our society today. i hear 1200 epstein victims and additional victims as young as nine to 10 years old. the challenge ahead today with honesty is what's the message we are sending out their? i shouldn't ask a question i don't know an answer to what i'm going to ask you right now.

please stand up and can you please raise your hand if you think after everything you have heard today you feel the a.g. defense has your back? for a sure hand if you are confident that we have got your back. that's an issue madam a.g.. we have to make sure the victims stand up and report crimes. otherwise we are taking a step backwards. today cyber, social media the new round for people to be hurt or attacked. these are the areas and i welcome the opportunity to work with you on. it's not your problem and it's not my problem it's our problem but to have redacted files they are not showing us the names of these is wrong.

these are very powerful people. this was a very expensive business and we don't know who they are. i would imagine they are prominent republicans and their republican democrats and we have to cover up for them. we need to know what's going on madam a.g.. will give you an opportunity to address my statement. i look forward to working with you on any crime involving child sex, children and cybercrimes. it's a problem throughout the country and ai you are correct ai is causing great problems on line and we are working on that though. ai is an incredible tool but also can be perilous victims of crime. someone i know we have been trying to help and i look forward to working with you on

that and cybercrime. as i said before to any victims we ask them to come forward to our office and we want to work with them. i have never not worked with the victim and i believe i've spoken to several of them. >> madd i can retain my time. if i can reclaim my time i think we start out by making sure those reductions are unredacted and those epstein files to make sure the public according to following the law that those names in those files are being up. there's no place for time and if they commit the crime they are going to know it and it starts with showing the names of the perpetrators and the epstein files. >> me a response to that? if any man's name was redacted that should not have been we

will of course unredacted it. the victim's name was unredacted please bring it to us and we will redacted. we were given 30 days to review and redacted and unredacted millions of pages of documents. our rate is very low. we will do everything we can. >> madam gen-y wants return to the point at the beginning of this hearing which was the jurisdiction that refuse to offer a request from customs and enforcement sanctuary jurisdiction. i know you were not involved directly in operations per se but you do deal with legal

issues surrounding these jurisdictions so let's say we have someone who's here illegally to as committed a crime and the thousand people you mentioned in california murder or sexual and drug traffickers. if that's individual is in a jurisdiction where they do not honor i.c.e. containers and any other jurisdiction where they do how does the nature of apprehending that person, how does the nature of i.c.e.'s involvement in that operation different? >> i believe we've seen that in minnesota where people were not cooperating with us. i believe there a lot of local law enforcement that would cooperate that we are doing anything in our power arrest and deport illegal criminal aliens and that's not going to stop under donald trump's administration.

why sanctuary cities are so dangerous, what we have seen a minneapolis. where do all the criminals go the gangs pda him as 13, they will go to a sanctuary jurisdiction because they believe they are protected and that's not fair to the citizens of the city. >> this is a point that there used to be a lot of consensus on. the idea that it's better to do a handoff to immigration authorities in the custodial setting rather than release them this is alejandro mayorkas before this committee and a parrot on a border security but he said i do not consider it public safety to release individuals and to the community without being released to immigration and customs enforcement. you have jurisdictions across the country including my state of california doing systematically precisely the things even alejandro mayorkas

said are for public safety, what does that say to you? it's a danger to the citizens of the community and thank you for fighting to protect them. >> absolute in having this conversation right now in relation to home as security funding i believe there's common sense performs that both sides would agree would make sense that those have to go hand-in-hand with performing this reckless practice are of refusing to cooperate in refusing to honor retainers and declaring oneself to be a sanctuary so i'm hoping we can find bipartisan support for what has long been a bipartisan system. i want to go to a second topic which is the school board which i know you have rescinded and it was a promulgated by attorney general garwin when he came into credit -- to office with president biden opening an investigation into parents who are showing up at school board meetings and expressing their views on open policies and other

issues. using the full apparatus of the federal law enforcement counterterrorism to go after these parents. he said because there was an increase thread but even his own fbi director christopher wray said there was no evidence yet nevertheless when asked if he regretted the memo attorney general garwin said there was absolute nothing wrong with the memo. i take it you disagree with that having not rescinded its? maye absolutely. i was one of the main focuses of president trump in this administration we will protect children in schools. we will protect parents lives for their children's education in our school system in this country. we will protect and we will protect everyone who wants to protestant want to protest in

front of an abortion clinic without being arrested they will do so. >> thank you very much and finally i thank you for your efforts to step up in the detection and rooting out the fraud. my home state of california any idea if there's any fraud going on in california. >> we are establishing as you've heard of fraud unit and i'm sorry you're having to deal with that in your state. the calgary is common. colin mcdonnell will hopefully be confirmed soon we are working on minneapolis. california was right up there and started safer both sides of the aisle that california is right up there with fraud. we are coming to your rescue in donald trump is coming to your rescue. >> thank you for much and you'll find what's happening pales to what's going on in minnesota. thank you and i yield back. >> the gentlelady from pennsylvania's recognize. >> thank you mr. chairman and

ms. bundy. president trump signed a memorandum known as nspm seven will to address domestic terrorism but americans across the political spectrum were immediately alarmed that the memos blurred the line between conduct and constitutional protected speech activity as well as his call to investigate prosecute and dismantle groups that the president stephen miller describe without evidence as quote and organize campaign of radical leftist terrorism. counterterrorism experts were further alarmed by the administration's singular focus on left-wing extremism combined with the sudden deletion from the doj web site of decades of research and law enforcement analysis which it concluded that right-wing extremism poses the greatest terrorism threat to america. the president's memo broadly and

vaguely links violent conduct the ideology and it targeted specifically anti-american anti-christian and anti-capitalist as well as quote hostility to so-called traditional american views on family religion and morality end quote. president trump has repeatedly and openly tried to brand his political opponents with these listed in his memo but as you know holding beliefs of the white house disagrees is not a crime and the statute defining domestic terrorism requires a criminal act, not just thoughts and ideas. that's what legal experts in nonprofit and religious freedom and civil rights activists immediately raise the alarm on the presidential directive for the politically motivated attack on a society designed to silence those who disagree with the administration. ms. bondi section 3 of that memo

directed u.s. attorney general to submit to the president and stephen miller a list of groups whose members are engaged and meet the definition of domestic terrorism. you directed the fbi to work with a variety of law enforcement entities to compile a list of groups and educate and engage in such acts. by january 3 of 2026 and you update that report every 30 days thereafter so can we assume you are persons under your direction at the department of justice have prepared that list of groups or entities who are designated as domestic terrorist organizations and that's a yes or no question. >> what i will say is i know antifa is part of that. >> reclaiming my time.

>> i am reclaiming my time. >> you don't want an answer. the gentlelady can proceed. >> will you commit to providing this committee with organizations that you have recommended be designated as domestic terrorist organizations? and we will comply with the law on all matters. >> will you commit to provide this committee with your list of entities that you recommend be designated as domestic terrorist organizations? >> i'm not going to commit to anything because you won't let me answer the question. >> okay than we do understand your current position is that you have a secret list of people or groups that you are accusing of domestic terrorism but you won't share it with congress and i remind you when the u.s.

government designates an entity of a foreign terrorist organization it must report back to congress and to the entity because the government can make a mistake in the entity has the opportunity to contest it's so your position seems to be you have falsely designated an american organization is a terrorist group. there is nothing they can do about it. i think we get it, you don't want to answer the question. >> you have done nothing for safety, nothing. >> thank you for the insult. the american people have every right to have answered that if you are prepared to answer truthfully here so we expect the facts to show the administration has a list of americans who the white house says are engaging domestic terrorism. those lists could include americans who have not committed any act of terrorism but simply disagree with this

administration people like renee good and alex pretti. this may include clergy elected officials and members of groups across the country and the list likely don't include proud boys were those who are convicted. americans have never tolerated political demagogues to use the government to punish people on an enemies list. the time of the gentlelady has expired. that's why we are so glad we have a memorandum targeting terror. as the gentleman from california just pointed out in his five minutes. the gentleman from kentucky is recognized for five minutes then mayor respond briefly? i don't want that to get away. >> mr. chairman behind me have three documents from the doj production and their diplomatic

of the massive failure for doj to comply with the epstein files compared -- conspiracy files into my right was an e-mail sent by the victim's lawyer said the doj. they are our list of names not to redact. list of names not to release. what did the doj do with this e-mail? they release this e-mail in the document production literally the worst thing you could do two survivors. you did and you were getting phonecalls and a lot of these people didn't want to be known. we know you touched on the document because you redacted one name any regard to the lawyer's name but you left the survivors in. the next document i want to show you it was in the title of the victim survivors names. the title of this one is child sex trafficking. co-conspirators, fully redacted and by the way wexner is in this

system deputy attorney general said he appears hundreds of times in the files but he doesn't appear in this file until it forced you to release it where he's listed as a co-conspirator not to tax evasion but to child's sex trafficking and not to prostitution not to money laundering child sex trafficking. and then finally what we have here is the third exhibit that i have emblematic of the release. these are the documents that we need that you are holding onto and over redacted because you have the names of the men who were implicated to how do we know? because the survivors gave testimony to the fbi and it's in there. what happens when you go to the portal of the doj to look at

what's behind this redaction? another redaction that we can even see and get some of these files view pulldown from the web site we will never see because we can't search the redactions. so i have several questions for you. are you able to track who in the organization made this massive failure and release the victims victim's names and are you able to track what was that obscure it lex wexner's name and a co-conspirator in the fbi document? do have the accountability. >> i believe wexner's name was listed more than 4000 times. >> yeah tired he told you that. >> can i finish my answer? come on, let me finish my answer. we corrected that within 40 minutes. you act like it's everybody's trying to cover up a wexner's

name. >> reclaiming my time. mr. chairman can i have my time back? the gentlelady can give her answer. >> i'm going to put the language of the bill up on the screen. >> mr. chairman can i answer that? i need to get my answer on that. >> with the attorney general respond. >> within 40 minutes you ask me a question and within 40 minutes a wexner's name was added back in. >> 40 minutes of me catching you red-handed. >> we invited u.n.. this guy has arrangement system. you are failed politician. >> mr. chairman please restore my time and remind the witness. >> there was no information and if there were i would abruptly

information yesterday that he trafficked in individuals. >> is that your position? speak my position is any victims to come forward of course we would love to hear from them. 1-800--call, fbi. did you ask eric garland that ended to talk about it. >> this is over ford administration's. let's go back to obama and let's go back to george bush. these coverups spanned decades and you are responsible for this portion of it. i want to know that what point did the fbi and the doj decides lex wexner was not a co-conspirator because our epstein filed transparency a.c.t. requires you and please put it back on the screen.

to release the internal decision about whether to prosecute him or not and it's not in the file and it's not in the files for any reason, may she answer? >> he's a hypocrite because he voted against the ban that we were talking about on ai and only two people voted against it and you are one of them hypocrites. the gentleman's time has expired. >> mr. chairman? >> the attorney general is allowed to respond the way she wants to respond to any member's question. >> i have a unanimous consent request. i'm submitting these 302 forms that are entirely redacted even when you go to look at them. i'm submitting away the statement that implicates lex wexner. i'm submitting an article from "the new york times" the

doj's -- the doj released photos and identifiable pictures of the victims and i'm submitting a letter from a.j. bundy in kash patel imploring him to quit keeping the files. you found out they were keeping files because they are still redacting files. >> we need to recess for votes and i'm submitting unanimous cans -- unanimous consent that those who resign because of the epstein files. >> how much time do we have left? i have learned late that they will wait on us. the chair now recognizes the gentleman from maryland. i appreciate what you said

attorney general bondi and you take the personal security of every member of congress seriously and people can contact you about that and that's a serious matter so i thank you for that. article ii section 1 clause seven of the constitution that domestic emoluments clause says the president is limited to his salary in office and cannot receive any other money from from the federal government while he's in office and he cannot be increased by 1 dollar. this present is the first president in u.s. history was repeatedly sued the federal government for $230 million for the judicial search warrant at mar-a-lago which is perfectly lawful and never struck down but now he's suing the irs for $10 billion. suing for $10 billion is 80% of its annual budget. because his tax returns were

leaked and they were illegally leaked by a private contractor who is in prison now charles lytle jones but he wants $10 billion. i want to ask you the question whether you think it would violate the emoluments clause for you to settle that $10 billion case or any of the other claims the president has made against the government he himself has remarked it's interesting because i'm the one that makes the deal and he says that kind of have to work it out with myself. do you think it would violate the domestic emoluments clause for the present work out a deal of people who were -- to get money to? >> i'm not going to discuss pending litigation. >> theoretically you are saying because his privacy rights were violated and that tax case, and they were. his mar-a-lago thing is but there's no doubt his tax returns

despite the fact that he promised to release them and despite the fact that every other president has released their tax returns he suffered embarrassment and he had a right for that not to happen. now i want to turn to the epstein survivors. president trump may have been a little bit embarrassed by the release of these tax returns. how much do you think the claims of these survivors are worth? as the good congressman from kentucky just pointed out there were lots of survivors who have decided for reasons of their own never to release their names. that determination was represented to people in congress and we built it into federal law that their names could not be released and yet you publish their names, their phone numbers, their dresses personally identifying information. if donald trump can get

$10 billion theoretically from the department of justice how much did these people get for far violation of their privacy rights and a far greater danger establishing them in their lives? do you even know who chase mode and is? you are so obsessed. >> you are the attorney general of the united states and we have rules here. >> you have arrangement syndrome. >> stop the clock. the gentleman from maryland can proceed. >> i want the whole country to look at this the attorney general of the united states this job is law enforcement and we have never had a witness who is misunderstood out rules have been unable to conform with rules before. we have only five minutes so we

use our time to ask a specific west in. i'm not yielding to you right now. ms. bondi the way it works is we ask you a question and you answer it in a fugue on a wild goose chase and attention start reading statistics are you start talking about our district i invite you to my district. come to my district but that's not what we are here to do today. if you do that we are allowed to take more time. at that point you have to be quiet. you have no choice so it helped understand the rules. and here's what i want to ask you. you are law enforcement and we have seen all kinds of evidence of crimes and the department of justice and we have see more evidence of crimes. will you create a joint task force at the department of justice and governors and state attorney generals and district

attorneys across the country to investigate the crimes that have taken place against these victims and more than a thousand like them? doj not doing its job, will you create a task force with state and local law enforcement to make that happen? >> the gentlelady can respond. >> thank you chairman. he called chase mulligan a wild goose chase and didn't even know who he was. he's a defendant in your own district who preyed on girls. >> if you're part of the epstein investigation you would do something about it. >> he committed sextortion. he didn't even know a tiny district who he was? >> the time of the gentleman has expired. i would remind the committee secretary mayorkas is here several times and he wouldn't answer our questions and when

the even only sent them ahead of time in writing. i think the attorney general is doing just fine. we have those are lenovo go to the gentleman from virginia and we will take your votes as the head of the floor is. >> attorney general bondi thank you for being here and i wanted to thank you for your work at doj in restoring the rule of law and urging transparency including jack investigation president trump cracking down on sanctuary jurisdictions and establishing a fraud enforcement division. let me first go to securing the border and immigration enforcement. our new governor has recently rescinded to cooperation between states and i.c.e.. can you talk about have you evaluated the public safety impact and how that would affect safety in virginia to withdraw that support and what that will do to a criminal like to be of illegal immigrants in virginia?

>> yes it would be judgmental and as you know congressman one of the top members of ms-13 in the entire country was living in virginia in a suburb among all of us, living half an hour away from where we are now. and and cool operation previously with the governor and with the members of the state of virginia. to catch him and take him off of our streets one of the heads for the entire country was living in virginia and it's a shame that that's happening now and thank you for talking about it. we are going to keep america safe and when people feel like they can sleep in the cities and states and be safe, they can

because donald trump is going to protect americans. we are going to protect the citizens there whether or not the governor, the mayors will do it or not but president trump is and we will keep americans safe from violent gang members. >> we appreciate that and we appreciate your work to keep virginia safe. i want to move on to the fraud enforcement division. my understanding this is an initiative is intended to coordinate enforcement of fraud laws a talk about california. would this affect virginia as well? >> absolutely and we look forward to working with you. >> would this affect things like long-term care senior living facilities who engage in medicaid fraud including overbilling practices and misappropriations of money. >> that exactly is what it's about for.

>> weather was related to fraud specifically another subject under the biden administration there was a sitting member of the general assembly under investigation and is that investigation is still ongoing? can you speak to that. >> i cannot. >> i'm going to move on to the 2nd amendment rights of law-abiding americans. lester president trump signed the one big beautiful bill into law which included the hearing protection act and part of it sponsored by myself and congressman clyde. to reduce the firearms act -- tax bring it to zero in a lot of taxes have been eliminated. requirements remain in effect and your doj has said that what even though the tax is reduced to zero registration requirement

is still somehow necessary even though with regard to obamacare the affordable care act when that mandate, when that tax penalty was it syria decided the mandate was no longer necessary. how are you justifying the existence of this registry. >> congressman that's pending litigation right now. >> it is and you would reconsider that? i yield back. >> the gentleman yield? >> attorney general bondi whetted jack have to pay a sick resource $20,000. >> i can't discuss anything on that matter but that's a good question. >> it's a good question because every republican in this town got telephone numbers and the

committee would like to know how many other sources he paid it wasn't more than $20,000 why he had to do that and when you can if you could get that information to the committee. the guy was trying to put the president of the united states imprisoned as as that whole thing was would like to know the answer and with that we will stand in recess. we have two quick votes on the floor and there's lunch if you need it and we normally have plenty. we will take a recess. >> can i ask for unanimous consent for

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